


The World Breaks

by blueangel



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV), Supernatural
Genre: Crossover, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-24
Updated: 2013-02-24
Packaged: 2017-12-03 10:09:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/697128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueangel/pseuds/blueangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sansa had seen what hunting did to people: the nightmares, the drinking, and the haunted look in her family’s eyes. All of it was enough to make her sick, and it became to her that the word ‘hunter’ was just another word for ‘broken’.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The World Breaks

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Supernatural/Game of Thrones crossover and I hope you enjoy.

When she was younger, tucked into her bed with a stuffed animal wolf by her side, and wearing purple flannel pajamas with rubber ducks stamped on the bottoms, she figured that monsters weren’t real- that they couldn’t be, she thought herself smarter than the average five year old.

* * *

 

Of course as grew up she learned that there were things that lurked in the dark, and more than anything she wished she could go back to the days of stories filled with princesses and knights, where happily ever after’s were possible.  But of course there isn’t-and she isn’t normal.

Like every good Stark she had been taught to shoot, burn, and if she ever ran into an Other- how to use dragon steel.

She never took to it though.

Arya, Robb, Jon, Bran, Rickon- they could do what she couldn’t- they could save the day. Try as she might she just didn’t have the heart for it. Sansa had seen what hunting did to people: the nightmares, the drinking, and the haunted look in her family’s eyes. All of it was enough to make her sick, and it became to her that the word ‘hunter’ was just another word for ‘broken’.

* * *

 

Her first hunt was a shape shifter, and despite everything- despite all her training- she ended up being knocked unconscious, and when she woke up it was to find Bran on the floor, bloody, with his hair slick with sweat and tinged with blood, and with the shifter standing over him.

Quite clearly she remembers the metallic smell of blood in the air that mixed in with the oil like scent of the warehouse, and it was enough to make her dizzy with a peculiar sickness that she later identifies as dread.

But when she looks back on that day the thing that rings in her mind is the sound of the gun shot that echoes through the almost empty space, and how the gun was so cool; how it made the almost perfect  _‘click’_ when she finally cocked it. And despite it all, she recalls in that moment just how heavy it felt- this piece of machinery that was so familiar and yet so alien.

At the end of it all it is just a lucky shot- just the adrenaline pumping through her.

She’d never forget that image of her brother lying face down on the warehouse floor. She’d never forget how Robb had finally busted down the door…and the look on his face- so pale, so determined.

 As long as she’d live she would never forget the weight of her brother’s body against her lap as they drove to the hospital or the look on her mother’s face as they were told that Bran would never be able to walk again.

The guilt would gnaw at her every time she saw her brother in his wheel chair, because it was her fault.

She had hesitated. The shifter had turned into her mother: red hair, with a bright smile and small crinkles at the corners of her eyes- and she had hesitated just a second. _Just a second,_ and now Bran was paralyzed from the waist down. Now every night she would replay the events in her head before finally waking up with smell of blood in her nose, and every time she would change the ending. She wouldn’t hesitate. She would be the hero.

* * *

 

 When she could she went off to college, hoping to make a new start for herself. Because she didn’t want to be fractured like the rest of her family- didn’t want to wake every day and try to convince herself that she wasn’t going to die that day. She didn’t want to feel the _guilt_ anymore _,_ and at that time she had thought running away was the solution.

And it worked for a little bit. She made friends who didn’t know that she kept a gun under her pillow, and she had a boyfriend, Joffrey, who was none the wiser about what her family did. She got used to the hustle and bustle of everyday life. Like the rest of the world she got to complain when she had a bad hair day and she laughed, giggled, and whined with the rest of the girls about their boyfriends/girlfriends. Sansa got used to the smell of freshly bought coffee in the morning and the sound of people: loud music and parties with the occasional fights and yelling. Sansa stressed over finals and celebrated when they were over with a good bottle of beer.

And for the first time, in a very long time, she felt like she didn’t have to keep looking over her shoulder.

Then it all went to hell.

 

* * *

Sansa didn’t know how long Joffrey had been possessed, but it had become apparent to her that he had been, when he holds her down on her dorm room bed and holds a knife to her throat, staring at her with black eyes. It’s curious that in that moment- that moment that she feels she is about to die- that she feels just how soft her comforter is and how sharp the knife is- how much it actually hurts to feel the steel press against her throat.

She’s ashamed of it later, but for a moment she contemplates letting him do it. Let this thing riding around in her boyfriend just slit her throat. She thinks about what people would say about her. Who would come to her funeral, and would they cry? It’s curious to think that after everything- after the life she’s fought for- that she would give it all up so easily, but then he whispers, _‘I can’t wait to string you from the inside out’_ , and it is enough to make her blood boil and adrenaline to pump through her- enough to make her blood sing. All thoughts of her imminent death go out of her mind, and it is at that point- between rage and terror- that with the voice of her father ringing in her ears she knees him in the stomach and with a quick hand grabs the gun from under her pillow and shoots him in the head.

Of course the shot brings people barging down her door.

* * *

 

It is between the police questioning her, _‘Self defense’, ‘no I don’t where the gun came from. He must’ve brought it with him,’_ and when Mya brings her back to her dorm, that Sansa finally understands what she’s done. It’s at that point that Sansa runs to the bathroom with Mya trailing after her, and throws the contents of her dinner onto the bathroom floor.  With her heart no longer beating in her ears she feels tears begin to run down her cheeks as Mya sits behinds her and tries to soothe her best friend the best way she knows.

For awhile Sansa sobs, and tells herself not to think about the blood that is now painted on her dorm room, or how her life is just not fucking fair. It is minutes, hour’s maybe, before she stumbles to a sink and splashes water on her face. She does not look in the mirror, doesn’t want to, because the only thing she’ll see is a _murderer._ Because righteous cause or not, that is what hunters are. No matter how her parents may try to dress it up everyone knows at the end of the day they will always have blood on their hands- there will always be another body to bury.

It is no surprise that people start to avoid her, and it is no surprise when she leaves college and goes back home- head down and tail between her legs.

Of course her mother welcomes her back with a warm hug and small words of comfort while Sansa tries not to break down again, and it is only the soothing sound of her mother’s voice and the spicy scent of her perfume that holds her together.

There is talk of sending her off to another university, but Sansa squashes the idea in her mind. She tells them that she is tired- that she is tired of it _all,_ and promptly locks herself in her room. They call her name, but Sansa just shuts them out and lets her head tip back against the edge of her bed. She lets herself mourn. Not a sobbing and screaming kind of mourning, but something quiet.

She sits in her room and let’s herself forget Joffrey- lets herself stuff him back in a dark corner of her mind, and when she comes out her family is sitting in the dining room table eating breakfast. Without a word she gets a bowl and spoon from the cupboard and sits down at the table.

‘’ Can you pass the cereal?’’ She asks Arya calmly, and at that exact moment Sansa has never been more grateful when her sister passes the box of Cheerios to her with nothing more than a raised eyebrow.  

Sansa feels everyone’s eyes on her as she pours milk into her bowl and takes her first bite. ‘’ Hey, Dad do you mind if I take the car in the garage- the old Mustang?’’ She says it so nonchalantly, but if anyone were to look closely they would see just how tightly Sansa was clutching her spoon when she looked at her father.

All around the table her family freezes and looks to the head of the table as Ned Stark takes in his daughters sad eyes, and how her stance seems to straighten with every passing second.

‘’ Of course.’’ As soon as the words leave his lips Catelyn stands up, hands flat on the table, ready to protest, but before she can get a word in Sansa drops her spoon into her bowl and gets up from the table.

‘’ Thanks.’’  Sansa feels a weight being taken off her shoulders as she dumps the bowl into the sink. She knew she was never going to stay here, because home just didn’t feel like _home_. It hadn’t in a long time.

* * *

 

Sansa had repacked a bag when her father knocks on her door.

Her father walks in with a somewhat awkward gait as he sits down next to her on her bed, and for a few moments both father and daughter sit in silence as they both contemplate what to say next.

‘’ Dad-‘’

He holds up his hand and she leans against him as he explains, ‘’ I knew you weren’t going to stay, and you know I’ve always wanted more for you, for all of you, but if this is what you want…you’re an adult. I can’t stop you, no matter what your mother says.’’ Sansa wraps her arms around him.

‘’ I’ll call at least once a week.’’ She promises.

‘’ At least every other day. Otherwise your mother will worry herself sick.’’

* * *

 

As she tosses her duffle bags in the back she wishes she felt something other than relief that she was leaving home again, after such a short time

The goodbyes are short and sweet and she’s getting good at them, but it is her mom who clings to Sansa the most.

‘’ You be careful.’’ She cups Sansa’s cheeks in her hands and lays a kiss on her forehead. ‘’ I love you.’’

Sansa smiles and kisses her mother on the cheek, ‘’ I love you too, and I’ll be fine. Don’t worry.’’

‘’ I have to worry, it’s what a mother does.’’

* * *

 

She likes the road more than she thought she would: likes the feel of the wind blowing through her hair and the sound of some happy pop melody blasting on the radio. There is a freedom in the roar of an engine and an open road. Granted, she doesn’t favor sleeping in a cheap motel and eating greasy food from questionable diners, but she supposes that she has to take the good with bad.

Then there is the hunting.

* * *

 

She tries to hold her lunch in as she exams the bodies, hearts eaten out and scratched. There is the overpowering aroma of disinfectant is in the air and more than anything she wants to get out of here as soon as possible. 

‘’Makes you sick doesn’t it?’’ She looks up to see the coroner eyeing her suspiciously. She looks back down at the body, a girl about a year younger than her, black hair and the remains of a cross tattooed onto her neck.

‘’ I’ve seen worse.’’  Sansa puts the sheet back and suppresses a shudder.

* * *

 

 For some reason she thought that the killing would get easier, but she sees the man, Tom, with his girlfriend, at his job. He looks so normal. But she knows he’s not, and she knows if she doesn’t stop him soon then he’ll just kill again. He doesn’t have a choice and neither does she.

Sansa waits until he is stumbling out of the bar one night, and follows him as he drives back to his apartment. She waits until he is sitting in front of the T.V., half passed out, to finally confront him.

When she looks back she remembers not the look of fear on his face, but the resignation as she had raised her gun. He hadn’t even put up a fight. He had wanted to die. 

* * *

 

‘’ I’m fine mom really.’’

‘’ It’s just- you’re on your own. I know that can get lonely-‘’

‘’Really mom I’m fine. I love you, but I need to speak to Bran. I need a ask him a few questions…..Yes I’ll be careful.’’

* * *

 

A chill comes up her spine as she spots bright blue eyes in the refection of the window. Quietly she sinks down against the broken dresser, careful of the creaking boards of the old house.

Sansa peeks around the corner, the light of a far away street light barely illuminating the house. It had been abandoned for awhile now, the former occupant having been attacked under mysterious circumstances. At first she had thought it was just a ghost, but after several of the reports on the other attacks-

She slides further back into the corners of the house. With slow movements she uncaps the hairspray with one hand, and flicks open the lighter in the other. Clutching both she gets up and makes her way out of the bedroom and into the living room.

She can barely see, and her heart beats loud in her ears.

_‘Thump, thump, thump, thump.’_

She flicks the lighter on, the little flame flickering and illuminating her hand.

She moves into the kitchen next. Nothing.

This was why her parents hadn’t wanted her hunting alone. They wanted someone to watch her back.

With a cry she is thrown into the wall. Both can and lighter clutter to the floor as icy hands clutch her. She gasps and claws as bright blue eyes gaze down at her. At first she simply claws at the hands that are choking her but then she throws out her hands trying to find the lighter.

She clenches her eyes shut and kicks as a wave if dizziness slams into her. It’s then she feels the lighter. Sansa doesn’t know how she does it, but suddenly she is holding the lighter towards the Wight’s face and its icy hands are no longer at her throat.

Sansa scrambles in the dark and finds the hairspray as the Whight charges again. She’s ready though. As lighter and aerosol met a jet of flame engulfs the creature.

‘’It worked,’’ she rubs her throat as she recalls how Arya was the one who had come up with the idea of the make shift flamethrower.  Sansa would have to thank her later. She gathers the missing cap to her hairspray and tries not to shiver at the charred mess on the floor as she shuts the already splintered front door.

* * *

 

Surprisingly she meets Willas Tyrell, not in a blaze of glory, but on the side of the road next to her broken down car.

She contemplates calling Arya who she knows is working a case just three states over, but dismisses the idea when she thinks of having to ride in the backseat of Gendry’s truck. For all her sister’s jokes about Sansa being a romantic, Arya was just as soft when it came to Gendry- most of the time.

Even if she wanted to call Arya she doubts she can- her cell has no signal.

Sansa licks her lips as the heat beats down onto her. Leave it to her to get stuck in the middle of nowhere.

She decides then that she should at least start walking, and if she’s lucky she’ll find a motel or a diner. She could have sworn she saw one just a few miles back. Sansa goes to the trunk of her car pulling out the duffle bag of clothes and another bag of weapons- both full and heavy. Her shoulders ache to think of carrying them.

Sansa hears the truck before she ever sees it.

Caked with mud and grime the truck stops in front of her, kicking up dust and making her cough.

‘’Need a ride?’’ Sansa drops her duffle bags and walks up to the passenger window. Toffee colored eyes met hers as she assesses the truck.

‘’ Yes, that would be wonderful.’’ She climbs into the passenger seat and notes the semi clean truck.

‘’Willas Tyrell,’’ she shakes his hand.

‘’Sansa Stark,’’ he raises an eyebrow and looks as if he is about to comment, but at the last second stops and starts the truck. There is no idle chatter, but a comfortable silence that makes Sansa lean back in her seat. She hadn’t let herself relax in such a long time. She hadn’t had the luxury. Sansa had made herself run so far for so long- she wasn’t surprised the car had broken down.

The ride is too short. He drops her off at the mechanics, ‘’ Thank you.’’ She says.

He just nods, ‘’ You’re welcome.’’ As she hops out from the back seat she can feel his eyes on her, and the Valaryian Steel dagger seems a little heavier at her ankle.

* * *

 

She sees Willas Tyrell again when he saves her from a nest of vampires.

‘’ You have got to be joking.’’ Sansa says as he unties her from the chair. Briefly she wonders if mom or dad sent him. There weren’t that many hunters were there? It couldn’t just be a coincidence.

She does not have any more time to think on it as she is dragged from the nest and put into the same truck she had climbed out of only a few days before. As they drive she notices the tightening of his hands on the wheel and the way he checks the rearview of his mirror.

‘’ Do think any of them are still alive?’’ She asks.

His lips thin. ‘’ I don’t know,’’ her fingers click against the truck door as she distractedly looks out the passenger window.

‘’Did one of my brothers send you to watch over me?’’ In the reflection of the window she sees him frown.

‘’Robb saved me back in-‘’

‘’I don’t want to hear it,’’ Sansa says tiredly.

‘’I just saved your life,’’ he admonishes. For a moment anger flashes inside her, but as soon as it is there, it’s gone.

‘’ Yes, and thank you for that, but I wanted to do this on my own.’’

‘’ You mean you wanted to die.’’ Sansa turns her head towards him, and as soon as he meets her eyes he knows he’s said the wrong thing. ‘’ I’m sorry-‘’ He starts, but she waves him off.

‘’Forget it. Just keep driving.’’ They don’t talk after at that, and soon as they park in the motel parking lot she gets out of the truck and goes to her room- ignoring Willas Tyrell as he calls her name.

* * *

 

Town after town, case after case, he is there with her. At first she is annoyed, but then he saves her from a changeling.

Then she saves him from a Siren.

Then he saves her from a Skinwalker.

Soon she is leaving her car in the garage for Rickon to pick up and they are arguing over which radio station to pick because she can’t stand country, and he won’t listen to pop.

Sansa likes that he opens the car door for her even when they are covered in blood and mud, or how she can make him laugh even if it’s three in the morning and all they want to do is go back to their separate hotel rooms and sleep.

* * *

 

Sometimes they’ll talk about their families (she mentions Joffrey in passing), but she loves to hear about the ranch that Willas grew up on, and his siblings.

In turn she talks about Arya, Jon, Bran, Rickon, her mother and father; piecing memories together from her childhood until she is giggling about one antic or another before she even finishes telling the story.

It’s then that she will call mother or Robb, and the ache in her heart lessens.

* * *

 

It is Bran that tells her dad is dead.

Between broken sobs he tells her that mom isn’t talking but wandering around the house as if she were a ghost, he hasn’t heard from Robb in days, and Arya and Rickon are on a rampage; suddenly the family she had pieced together had shattered.

She feels Willas’s arms around her as she hangs up, tears now silently dripping on the cotton of his shirt.

‘’ My dad, he’s dead,’’ she croaks, he pulls her closer until her hands are clutching at the back of his t-shirt.

* * *

 

Bran says that she shouldn’t come home for awhile; _it’ll only make things harder._

So she and Willas go from job to job; there are no breaks (not for her). Willas doesn’t say much, but sometimes if she’s on the verge of tears he’ll hold her hand; it gives her something to focus on rather than the sadness.  

(But they don’t turn on the radio anymore).

* * *

 

Soon Sansa stops listening to her voice mail.

_‘’Sansa have you heard from Arya or Rickon? I tried to call Gendry but he didn’t answer…..’’_

_‘’…..Have you heard from Robb yet...Jon’s looking for him.’’_

_‘’Sansa mom’s gone. I don’t know where; I just woke up this morning and she was gone. Jojen is looking for her though, and Meera is here, but please call me back. I miss you.’’_

She leaves a few voice mails, but she thinks that Willas is calling Bran secretly, just to tell him that she has someone- that she isn’t alone.

* * *

 

She thinks of going home, but then it isn’t really _home_ anymore, is it? Not when her family was her home, and now all of them are practically gone.

(She wishes more than anything that she would have realized it sooner).

* * *

 

When Sansa dies her hair brown in the motel bathroom, with some ten dollar hair dye she grabbed at the store, Willas frowns.

‘’ I liked it better the other way,’’ he says, fingering a muddy lock. Sansa blushes but shakes her head.

* * *

 

One day she wakes up from a dream, but this time it’s not a nightmare.

(Instead, it makes her ache, and she won’t Willas’s eyes for days afterward).

* * *

 

Sansa doesn’t quite how, but somehow she and Willas end up on the side of a deserted road, both of them pushing clothes aside just feel skin on skin.

‘’ Sansa,’’ he whispers into her neck, licking the sweat off her collarbone. She tightens her thighs around him, and moans.

* * *

 

They don’t talk about it. They don’t talk about anything anymore.

(At least, nothing important).

* * *

 

Cold hands grips her throat as bright blue eyes gaze at her, (an unnatural blue that shines like stars).

Sansa cannot think of anything but the cold that creeps into her lungs and steals her breath; numbs her fingers. It is all too _much_.

Then she hears the sound of bones snapping, and Willas cry out, and then it is like she is back in her dorm and the need to live swells up. She fingerers her dagger, the one her father gave her when she was no more than a little girl, and she can almost feel the word inscribed on the hilt, _Glacies._

_Ice_

Then she is tearing through the cold until the Others are no more than puddles, but it’s still too late.

Willas lay dead on the floor, his neck snapped, and his obsidian dagger just out of reach.

Something breaks in Sansa; leaves her empty, and she knows that she doesn’t have the heart to burn him.

* * *

 

No one will answer her calls: not Willas’s siblings or Bran. (She even tries Robb and Arya and mom).

It is not like she means to, but is as if she is outside herself now and nothing else matters but lessening the emptiness that grows in her.

* * *

 

There is dirt under her fingernails, and a slender man whose eyes change from red to grey-green. Sansa does not even hesitate to take his hand as he pulls her to him to place a kiss on her lips.

‘’Ten years, my dear,’’ he whispers into her ear, and then he is gone as quickly as he came.

 (She’ll make them count. She won’t waste them).

Sansa trudges back to the truck, making her way to the empty house where no doubt Willas will be waking up soon.

‘’Ten years,’’ she whispers to herself.

**Author's Note:**

> The title is taken from the quote, ''The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places.'' Ernest Hemingway


End file.
